Three months from the opening of the Kia Motors assembly plant in West Point, the good news from the South Korean automobile manufacturer continues to roll.
Wednesday, the company announced that second-quarter net profit quadrupled on the strength of higher sales. Kia earned $279 million in the quarter ending June 30.
The company also announced that July global sales were up 17.5 percent for passenger cars, recreational vehicles and commercial vehicles. That translated into 143,588 vehicles last month.
“This goes to show the plum that has landed in Georgia,” said Kia Motors Manufacturing Georgia Director of Human Resources Randy Jackson. “We are growing rapidly, investing a lot of money in Georgia and our partnership with the state of Georgia.”
The Troup County plant, the first Kia manufacturing facility in North America, is scheduled to start production in November and its employee base is about to reach 1,000.
The Kia sales numbers for July, released by the company, showed impressive growth.
Kia posted year-on-year sales increases in China of 101 percent with sales of 22,367 vehicles. In Korea, the 34,811 vehicles sold was a 26.5 percent increase over the previous year. In North America, Kia sold 34,455 vehicles for a nearly 8 percent increase over July 2008.
But those are not the numbers that are most important in the Chattahoochee Valley. With Georgia unemployment nearing 10 percent, Kia is providing much-anticipated jobs.
By next week, there will be more than 1,000 local employees working for Kia. About a month from now, that number will reach 1,250, which is what will be needed to start production with a single shift.
Suppliers add jobs
The Kia suppliers will provide another 2,500 to 3,000 jobs by the end of the year.
By the time full production is reached in the middle of next year, there could be as many as 3,000 people employed by Kia and a total of 10,000 in the region with Kia and the suppliers, Jackson said.
Currently, employees are being trained in South Korea, Slovakia and the Hyundai plant in Montgomery, Ala.
Kia is a subsidiary of Hyundai Motor Co., South Korea’s largest automaker. Together, they formed the world’s fifth-largest automotive group in 2008.
Kia has previously announced that the next generation Sorento, a sports utility vehicle will be assembled in West Point.
“We have not decided on what other models will be assembled here,” Jackson said. “We want to concentrate on this vehicle first.”
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